2024 presidential candidates on education

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Presidential election
Presidential candidates
Republican nomination

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This page includes statements from the 2024 presidential candidates on education. These statements were compiled from each candidate's official campaign website, editorials, speeches, and debates.

The candidates featured on this page are the noteworthy Democratic and Republican candidates in the 2024 presidential election. Only candidates who address this page's issue on their campaign website, in public statements, or in public speeches have a quote featured on this page. See something we missed? Email us. The active noteworthy presidential candidates are:

Kamala Harris (D)
Donald Trump (R)
Chase Oliver (L)
Jill Stein (G)

Education

Democratic candidates

Kamala D. Harris

Harris' campaign website said, "Vice President Harris will fight to ensure parents can afford high-quality child care and preschool for their children. She will strengthen public education and training as a pathway to the middle class. And she’ll continue working to end the unreasonable burden of student loan debt and fight to make higher education more affordable, so that college can be a ticket to the middle class. To date, Vice President Harris has helped deliver the largest investment in public education in American history, provide nearly $170 billion in student debt relief for almost five million borrowers, and deliver record investments in HBCUs, Tribal Colleges, Hispanic-Serving Institutions, and other minority-serving institutions. She helped more students afford college by increasing the maximum Pell Grant award by $900—the largest increase in more than a decade—and invested in community colleges. She has implemented policies that have led to over one million registered apprentices being hired, and she will do even more to scale up programs that create good career pathways for non-college graduates." ^{[source, as of 2024-09-09]}

Dean Phillips

Phillips' campaign website said, "We must work together at all levels of government to ensure that every American child receives a world-class public education—no matter their race or zip code. I’ve spent the majority of my adult life working to create more opportunity for young people, and I will continue to make that a top priority as a member of Congress." ^{[source, as of 2023-12-19]}

Marianne Williamson

Williamson's campaign website said, "Every public school in America should be a palace of learning, culture and the arts. That will be a primary goal of the Williamson administration. Education is a central tenet of our inalienable right to the 'pursuit of happiness,' as it immeasurably expands one’s ability to actualize our God-given talents. All students deserve a world class public school education. ^{[source, as of 2023-12-19]}

Republican candidates

Ron DeSantis

DeSantis' campaign website said, "DeSantis will support school choice nationwide, protect parental rights, reform accreditation, and steer funding towards programs and institutions that support the jobs of the future. Our students will learn how to read, write, do math, and think critically instead of learning to hate our country. DeSantis will educate artisans and engineers instead of politicized administrators and bureaucrats, seeking to accelerate students along these career paths as early as possible." ^{[source, as of 2023-12-19]}

Nikki Haley

In a Republican debate Haley said, "And we can talk about all of these things, and there’s a lot of crazy, woke things happening in schools, but we have got to get these kids reading. If a child can’t read by third grade, they’re four times less likely to graduate high school. So we need to make sure we bring in reading remediation all over this country. We need transparency in the classroom, because parents should never have to wonder what’s being said or taught to their children in the classroom. Parents need to be deciding which schools their kids go to, because they know best. And let’s put vocational classes back into the high schools. Let’s teach our kids to build things again. When we do that, and we allow that innovation, that’s when it’ll get back." ^{[source, as of 2023-08-23]}

Asa Hutchinson

In a Republican debate, Hutchinson said, "We have to compete with China. I built computer science education. We led the nation in computer science education, going from 1,100 students to 23,000 students taking it. This is how you compete with China. As president of the United States, I will make sure we go from 51 percent of our schools offering computer science to every school in rural areas and urban areas offering computer science for the benefit of our kids, and we can compete with China in terms of technology." ^{[source, as of 2023-08-23]}

Vivek Ramaswamy

In a Republican debate, Ramaswamy said, "We have a crisis of achievement. Let’s shut down the head of the snake, the Department of Education. Take that $80 billion, put it in the hands of the parents across this country. This is the civil rights issue of our time. Allow any parent to choose where they send their kids to school. End the teachers unions at the local level to allow public schools to compete." ^{[source, as of 2023-08-23]}

Donald Trump

Trump's campaign website said, "President Trump believes that we owe our children great schools that lead to great jobs, which will lead to an even greater country than we're living in right now. To that end, President Trump will work to ensure that a top priority of every school is to prepare students for jobs. In connection with totally refocusing schools on succeeding in the world of work, President Trump pledges to close the Department of Education in Washington, D.C. and to send all education work and needs back to the States." ^{[source, as of 2023-12-21]}